"it's a good one to remember"

Today was a gorgeous spring day. I spent much of it outside walking or gardening, and the beautiful freshness of spring just made me crave a healthy meal.

So, I checked the content of my fridge and was inspired. I served pan seared tilapia with a roasted red pepper sauce, roasted curried cauliflower, and a fennel orange and mint salad.



Tilapia
- four small tilapia fillets
- salt, pepper
- 2 tsp lemon oil
Pat the fillets dry and salt and pepper both sides. Heat oil in fry pan on Med-High heat making sure entire surface is coated. Add fish and cook for 8-10 minutes, turning once.
Tilapia could not be easier to prepare; however, it is very bland and requires either a very flavorful sauce or some intense seasoning to be good. Tonight, I opted for the former.


Roasted Red Pepper sauce
- 2 red bell peppers
- 1 clove garlic
- 2 TBSP olive oil
- salt/pepper
- 1 TBSP butter
- 1 cup fat free Greek yogurt
- rough chopped basil (in sauce and for garnish, to taste)

First, roast the red peppers: Put them under the broiler or over  a burner (turning when necessary) until skin is charred and blistered. Put in a plastic bag and allow to cool for 45 minutes. The skin will separate from the flesh very easily at this point. Discard seeds and blackened skin and put the softened flesh into a food processor or blender.
Next, roast the garlic (these two steps actually overlapped for me). Cut the roots off of a garlic head, and put the head on a piece of aluminum foil. Drizzle with olive oil and then wrap it up and roast it for around 30 minutes. Cutting the roots off instead of cutting the top off allows for very easy removal of the garlic cloves once they are roasted-- you can literally just squeeze them out! Once pieces are roasted, squeeze them into the food processor with the red pepper.
Add the olive oil and pulse til smooth. Optional-- you can add basil at this point and puree. I rough chopped and saved it til later.
In a small sauce pan, melt the butter, and then add the puree to the pan. Add yogurt (milk would also work) and basil if you have not yet. Salt and pepper to taste.
This sauce was AMAZING. It is sweet and flavorful, and Tim has already come up with many more uses for it (veggie dip, on crackers, etc). I will DEFINITELY be making this again. I think I would like to try other bell peppers too 

Roasted Curried Cauliflower
- 1 head cauliflower
- 2 TBSP olive oil
- curry powder, salt, and pepper to taste

Chop up cauliflower to even sized florets. Put in a 9 x 13 pan. Drizzle with alive oil, and sprinkle with desired seasonings (I think I used about a TBSP of curry and a 5 "twists" each of cracked pepper and sea salt). Toss til all pieces are evenly coated. Put in a 425 oven for 40 minutes. Take out and re-toss half way. I always forget about cauliflower, but I saw a recipe similar to this last week and thought it sounded good. The curry gave it some good flavor without being over powering, and roasting it allowed some of the florets to caramelize and brown on top which was pretty fantastic. Tim liked it too, especially doused in the red pepper sauce.


Fennel, Orange, and Mint Salad
I was inspired by this recipe. I followed the recipe in terms of ingredients (fennel, orange, almond, and mint; EVOO, OJ, and mustard for the dressing) but not at all for the proportions. I don't really know how much of each ingredient I used other than oranges (1.5) and fennel (1 bulb). Anyway, it was a DELISH. Tim was less excited about this than the rest of the meal, though he did say he liked the fennel. It tasted springy and fresh to me, and I hope to have it again soon. I might try keeping the fennel raw for some variety.